A senior Iranian cleric has censured the Bahraini regime for expelling the representative of Iraq-based Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.
“We strongly condemn (such) measures by the al-Khalifa and announce that we will never leave… Bahraini people alone,” Grand Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamedani said in the holy city of Qom on Saturday.
On Wednesday, Bahraini authorities expelled Sistani’s representative, Hussein al-Najati, in the latest sign of tension with the Shia majority in the Persian Gulf country.
Nouri Hamedani said the move is a “sign of the Al Khlifa’s fall.”
Manama accuses Najati of not being transparent and says he did not have the official approval of the regime.
On Thursday, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hossein Amir-Abdollahian also slammed Najati’s expulsion.
Najati was responsible for collecting and redistributing religious donations on behalf of Sistani.
Since mid-February 2011, thousands of pro-democracy protesters have held numerous demonstrations in the streets of Bahrain, calling for the Al Khalifa royal family to relinquish power.
On March 14, 2011, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates invaded the country to assist the Bahraini government in its crackdown on peaceful protesters.
According to local sources, scores of people have been killed and hundreds arrested.
Physicians for Human Rights says doctors and nurses have been detained, tortured, or disappeared because they have "evidence of atrocities committed by the authorities, security forces, and riot police" in the crackdown on anti-government protesters.
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